Rates of violent crimes and property crimes are lower than they've been since the 1960s and they continue to fall statewide and nationally.

The gaping disparity between perception and reality, said Brian Renauer, can affect everything from public policy to law enforcement's ability to keep the public safe -- even simple livability and peace of mind. Renauer, associate professor of criminology and criminal justice, directs PSU's Criminal Justice Policy Research Institute, which conducted the telephone survey from June 15 to July 27 last year.

The report released this week is the first of a handful of analyses based on the survey.

Around the time survey results arrived, Oregon's Criminal Justice Commission released a report about property crime being at an all-time low. "What I noticed right away," Renauer said, "was that perceptions about crime didn't seem to match up with trends in crime."

In the PSU survey, only 10 percent of respondents said they believed the crime rate had dropped during the preceding year, while 38 percent said they thought the rate had stayed the same. Researchers figured the margin of error at about 2.47 percentage points.

Respondents who said they thought crime had climbed were more inclined to define themselves as conservative. They typically did not have bachelor's degrees, reported their family income at less than $50,000 and said they were dissatisfied with the criminal justice system. Of that group, 45 percent ranked punishment and enforcement as top crime-control measures.

People saw their own communities in a more positive light, with only 25 percent saying they believed that local crime had increased.

The Oregon reality: From 2008 to 2009, violent crime fell 2.1 percent, putting the state's rate at 38th nationally. Oregon's property crime rate ranked 23rd in the nation in 2009, and that year the rate was the lowest since 1966.

Sociologists long have studied fear as an indirect effect of crime, and conclude it has contributed to everything from political campaigns with a law-and-order bent to the rapid growth of gated communities and the security industry.

Some studies show a strong correlation between fear of crime and media consumption -- from the abundance of crime reports in newspapers and on TV to the plethora of forensics and cop dramas on the tube night and day.

A 2009 Purdue University survey found that those who watched lots of crime shows estimated real-world deaths due to murder at 2 1/2 times more than non-viewers.

Renauer wanted to include such questions in the PSU study, but they were axed when the survey grew so long it verged on cumbersome, he said. The approximately 50-question survey took 15 to 20 minutes to complete. Residents were randomly sampled in the Willamette Valley, the coast, southern and eastern Oregon.

The six-week survey period wasn't particularly crime-riddled, Renauer said. News of the Kyron Horman investigation had slowed. "There was nothing major that would have impacted the survey," he said.

Renauer said those in criminal justice, local governments and state legislators contribute to misperceptions about crime. Officials, he said, have done a poor job of sharing their successes with the public.

"We're doing incredible things in the criminal justice system," he said, "and the public needs to hear this. They are living in a safer society than they were 10 years ago, 20 years ago."

Those communication failures, he said, contribute to public dissatisfaction with the system and distrust of government.

"I do know that many in law enforcement feel that a lot of the positive things they're doing don't make it into the media," Renauer said. "To them, it seems like it's the negative images or stories often being portrayed."

Research shows that the more residents trust those who make and enforce laws, the more likely they are to obey laws, he said. "They're more likely to comply with legal authority, to report crimes and to be good witnesses, which in turn is going to help the system solve cases and even do a better job of creating public safety."

PSU distributed the survey's crime-perception results by e-mail to sheriffs' and police chiefs' associations, district attorneys and the Senate Judiciary Committee.

"Mayors, city council members, legislators -- all these people don't really talk about this stuff," Renauer said. "It's important for the public to know that ... the government is doing some good things to make it safer for them. They should promote it."

In the next few months, PSU plans to release more analyses from the survey. Reports will focus on perceptions of and satisfaction with the criminal justice system, and on public preferences related to crime policy: tough sentencing, for instance, vs. rehabilitation and treatment programs.